Middle Sister Mt.

Date Hiked: 14 May 2024

Mileage: 3.71 miles

Elevation: 2,121ft

Difficulty: Hard

Features: Square-topped summit, rock scramble, open meadow, unmaintained trail, views of North and South Sister Mt., Monashka Bay, and City of Kodiak

Description: The snowy hike was the second time I hiked Middle Sister Mt., but the first time I did it without reaching another summit first. We started on the longer North Sister Mountain trail until reaching the saddle between North and Middle Sister. After the saddle, we followed the right-hand trail up middle sister where we climbed some fun, exposed rock scrambles to the summit. The trail and summit featured breathtaking snow-covered views of South Sister, the valley, and North Sister.

Several feet of snow covered the majority of the trail, beginning after the initial steep incline on the North Sister Trail and continuing until just before the rock scramble up Middle Sister. It was very hard to hike through without snowshoes and we had to make our own trail most of the time since we couldn’t find the normal one with all the snow. We would walk on top the snow for 10-20 seconds before suddenly falling through to our waist. It felt like we were cartoon characters in a comedy, plodding along until BLOOP! One of us would suddenly fall in. The snow also lent itself well to long penguin slides on the way down. Would do it again, but with snowshoes hopefully. This hike included maybe my sketchiest headstand spot… but we also saw about 15 mountain goats on South Sister!

In the previous October I also hiked Middle Sister. My friend and I summited North Sister and impromptu also summited Middle Sister and watched the sunset… before running down to avoid being stuck up there in the dark. It was very beautiful!

Photos below are from a hike of Middle Sister in May with snow and October.